Brussels, 13/03/2001 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday, the European Parliament will be discussing the Giovanni Claudio Fava report (Italian, Democratici di sinistra) on the European Commission's communication on EU electoral assistance and observation missions, report that places special emphasis on the need to avoid dual usage between the activities of different organisations during the monitoring of elections in third countries. In his lengthy resolution (69 points), Mr. Fava calls on the European Commission to establish, in the framework of such missions, partnership agreements with the international organisations concerned, and especially the OSCE and the Council of Europe and, to that end, organise a conference with the participation of those organisations, the European Parliament, the EU Council and Member States. According to Fava, the European Parliamentary delegation should, as far as possible, co-chair international missions responsible for monitoring elections, together with other parliamentary delegations (of the Assembly of the Council of Europe and the OSCE, in particular).
In his report, Fava considers that the EP should create its own structures for monitoring elections, and set up an "election coordination group". While recalling that observation missions organised by the EP are set up in response to an official invitation by the country concerned, the rapporteur considers that Parliament should itself be able to propose sending a delegation if there is "political interest" in monitoring an election (whereas it should decline sending any delegation if the minimum conditions set by the EU's guidelines are not met). Recalling that the elections which are the subject of monitoring missions must in principle be the first free and democratic elections to be held in a country, and that they must be legislative elections, Mr. Fava notes that it has been admitted that these rules were too restrictive, notably concerning the countries of former Yugoslavia. Thus, for example, the sending of an observation mission was approved for the local elections in Bosnia-Herzegovina (as well as for the referendum over the new Albanian Constitution, in 1998).
The rapporteur cites several concrete examples of EU-led observation missions, placing emphasis on the need for greater visibility of this Union role. As opposed to the United States, the European Union does not hand such missions to "retired high-level politicians", and thus there is less reporting in the media, he observes, considering that one of the worst examples of the lack of the EP's visibility was that of the observation of elections in Albania in 1997, where nine MEPs had participated in a mission under the auspices of the OSCE One positive example is that of the EP monitoring mission in last year's elections in Zimbabwe, Fava points out, recalling that European Commissioner Chris Patten had considered that the reputation of Pierre Schori, MEP who led the EP delegation (and who is now Sweden's representative to the United Nations: Ed.), had been a key-factor in the mission's success.